The Brain: Morality Is Processed Differently By Liberals And Conservatives
India-West News Desk
SANTA BARBARA, CA – A recent study led by UC Santa Barbara’s René Weber explored the neurological basis of moral judgments, revealing insights into how the brain processes moral versus non-moral issues and supporting a pluralist view of morality. Traditionally, philosophers and psychologists have debated whether moral judgments are unified by a single principle, as moral monists argue, or if they vary across different categories, as pluralists contend.
This study used Moral Foundations Theory (MFT), which identifies six universal moral foundations: care/harm, fairness/cheating, liberty/oppression, loyalty/betrayal, authority/subversion, and sanctity/degradation. These foundations are further grouped into “individualizing” foundations (care/harm and fairness/cheating), focused on protecting individual rights, and “binding” foundations (loyalty, authority, and sanctity), which emphasize group cohesion.
The study monitored 64 participants through brain imaging as they judged behaviors violating moral and social norms. The findings showed distinct brain patterns associated with each moral foundation, indicating that moral reasoning is complex and recruits multiple neural regions rather than a single “moral center.” For example, moral transgressions, such as cheating, activated a network involving the medial prefrontal cortex and temporoparietal junction—regions tied to understanding others’ perspectives, or “theory of mind.”
Interestingly, brain activity differed based on the type of moral issue. Transgressions concerning loyalty, authority, and sanctity prompted heightened responses in regions linked to evaluating others’ actions, reinforcing MFT’s division between individual and group-focused moral foundations. The researchers also observed differences in moral evaluations between liberals and conservatives: liberals showed stronger responses to individualizing foundations, while conservatives were more responsive to binding foundations. This neurological evidence aligns with survey data suggesting that political leanings shape moral sensitivity to various foundations.
Using a machine-learning model, the team could predict which moral foundation a participant was evaluating based on their brain activity, highlighting that different moral categories have unique neural signatures. The findings suggest that while moral judgments share a general neurological framework, they are differentiated by specific activations across the brain.
This research sheds light on how moral reasoning operates at both individual and group levels and reflects broader social and political values. By illustrating the brain’s complex engagement in moral judgments, the study underscores that moral values are deeply embedded in our neurological architecture. These insights help explain how varying emphases on different moral foundations influence social behavior, group identity, and political polarization, illustrating that moral reasoning is both universal and distinct across individuals and groups.
